Memorial Hospital v. Maricopa County 8212 847

• Citation: 94 S.Ct. 1076,39 L.Ed.2d 306,415 U.S. 250
• Decision Date: 26 February 1974
• Docket Number: No. 72,72
• Parties: MEMORIAL HOSPITAL et al., Appellants, v. MARICOPA COUNTY et al. —847
• Court: United States Supreme Court

415 U.S. 250

94 S.Ct. 1076

39 L.Ed.2d 306

MEMORIAL HOSPITAL et al., Appellants,

v MARICOPA COUNTY et al.

No. 72—847.

Argued Nov. 6, 1973.

Decided Feb. 26, 1974.

Syllabus

This is an appeal from a decision of the Arizona Supreme Court upholding the constitutionality of an Arizona statute requiring a year's residence in a county as a condition to an indigent's receiving nonemergency hospitalization or medical care at the county's expense. Held: The durational residence requirement, in violation of the Equal Protection Clause, creates an 'invidious classification' that impinges on the right of interstate travel by denying newcomers 'basic necessities of life.' Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600. Pp. 253—270.

(a) Such a requirement, since it operates to penalize indigents for exercising their constitutional right of interstate migration, must be justified by a compelling state interest. Shapiro v. Thompson, supra; Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274. Pp. 253—262.

(b) The State has not shown that the durational residence requirement is 'legitimately defensible' in that it furthers a compelling state interest, and none of the purposes asserted as justification for the requirement—fiscal savings, inhibiting migration of indigents generally, deterring indigents from taking up residence in the county solely to utilize the medical facilities, protection of longtime residents who have contributed to the community particularly by paying taxes, maintaining public support of the county hospital, administrative convenience in determining bona fide residence, prevention of fraud, and budget predictability—satisfies the State's burden of justification and insures that the State, in pursuing its asserted objectives, has chosen means that do not unnecessarily impinge on constitutionally protected interests. Pp. 262—269.

108 Ariz. 373, 498 P.2d 461, reversed and remanded.

Mary M. Schroeder, Washington, D.C., for appellants.

William J. Carter, III, Phoenix, Ariz., for appellees.

Mr. Justice MARSHALL delivered the opinion of the Court.

This case presents an appeal from a decision of the Arizona Supreme Court upholding an Arizona statute requiring a year's residence in a county as a condition to receiving nonemergency hospitalization or medical care at the county's expense. The constitutional question presented is whether this durational residence requirement is repugnant to the Equal Protection Clause as applied by this Court in Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969).

I

Appellant Henry Evaro is an indigent suffering from a chronic asthmatic and bronchial illness. In early June 1971, Mr. Evaro moved from New Mexico to Phoenix in Maricopa County, Arizona. On July 8, 1971, Evaro had a severe respiratory attack and was sent by his attending physician to appellant Memorial Hospital, a nonprofit private community hospital. Pursuant to the Arizona statute governing medical care for indigents, Memorial notified the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors that it had in its charge an indigent who might qualify for county care and requested that Evaro be transferred to the County's public hospital facility. In accordance with the approved procedures, Memorial also claimed reimbursement from the County in the amount of $1,202.60, for the care and services it had provided Evaro.

Under Arizona law, the individual county governments are charged with the mandatory duty of providing necessary hospital and medical care for their indigent sick.¹ But the statute requires an indigent to have been a resident of the County for the preceding 12 months in order to be eligible for free nonemergency medical care.² Maricopa County refused to admit Evaro to its public hospital or to reimburse Memorial solely because Evaro had not been a resident of the County for the preceding year. Appellees do not dispute that Evaro is an indigent or that he is a bona fide resident of Maricopa County. ³

This action was instituted to determine whether appellee Maricopa County was obligated to provide medical care for Evaro or was liable to Memorial for the costs it incurred because of the County's refusal to do so. This controversy necessarily requires an adjudication of the constitutionality of the Arizona dura- tional residence requirement for providing free medical care to indigents.

The trial court held the residence requirement unconstitutional as a violation of the Equal Protection Clause. In a prior there-judge federal court suit against Pinal County, Arizona, the District Court had also declared the residence requirement unconstitutional and had enjoined its future application in Pinal County. Valenciano v. Bateman, 323 F.Supp. 600 (D.C.Ariz.1971).⁴ Nonetheless, the Arizona Supreme Court upheld the challenged requirement. To resolve this conflict between a federal court and the highest court of the State, we noted probable jurisdiction, 410 U.S. 981, 93 S.Ct. 1499, 36 L.Ed.2d 176 (1972), and we reverse the judgment of the Arizona Supreme Court.

II

In determining whether the challenged durational residence provision violates the Equal Protection Clause, we must first determine what burden of justification the classification created thereby must meet, by looking to the nature of the classification and the individual interests affected.⁵ The Court considered similar durational residence requirements for welfare assistance in Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969). The Court observed that those requirements created two classes of needy residents 'indistinguishable from each other except that one is composed of residents who have resided a year or more, and the second of residents who have resided less than a year, in the jurisdiction. On the basis of this sole difference the first class (was) granted and second class (was) denied welfare aid upon which may depend the ability . . . to obtain the very means to subsist food, shelter, and other necessities of life.' Id., at 627, 89 S.Ct., at 1327. The Court found that because this classification impinged on the constitutionally guaranteed right of interstate travel, it was to be judged by the standard of whether it promoted a compelling state interest.⁶ Finding such an interest wanting, the Court held the challenged residence requirements unconstitutional.

Appellees argue that the residence requirement before us is distinguishable from those in Shapiro, while appellants urge that Shapiro is controlling. We agree with appellants that Arizona's durational residence requirement for free medical care must be justified by a compelling state interest and that, such interests being lacking, the requirement is unconstitutional.

III

The right of interstate travel has repeatedly been recognized as a basic constitutional freedom.⁷ Whatever its ultimate scope, however, the right to travel, was involved in only a limited sense in Shapiro. The Court was there concerned only with the right to migrate, 'with intent to settle and abide' ⁸ or, as the Court put it, 'to migrate, resettle, find a new job, and start a new life.' Id., at 629, 89 S.Ct., at 1328. Even a bona fide residence requirement would burden the right to travel, if travel meant merely movement. But, in Shapiro, the Court explained that '(t)he residence requirement and the one-year waiting-period requirement are distinct and independent prerequisites' for assistance and only the latter was held to be unconstitutional. Id., at 636, 89 S.Ct., at 1332. Later, in invalidating a durational residence requirement for voter registration on the basis of Shapiro, we cautioned that our decision was not intended to 'cast doubt on the validity of appropriately defined and uniformly applied bona fide residence requirements.' Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 342 n. 13, 92 S.Ct. 995, 1003 (1972).

IV

The appellees argue that the instant county residence requirement is distinguishable from the state residence requirements in Shapiro, in that the former penalizes, not interstate, but rather intrastate, travel. Even were we to draw a constitutional distinction between interstate and intrastate travel, a question we do not now consider, such a distinction would not support the judgment of the Arizona court in the case before us. Appellant Evaro has been effectively penalized for his interstate migration, although this was accomplished under the guise of a county residence requirement. What would be unconstitutional if done directly by the State can no more readily be accomplished by a county at the State's direction. The Arizona Supreme Court could have construed the waiting-period requirement to apply to intrastate but not interstate migrants;⁹ but it did not do so, and 'it is not our function to construe a state statute contrary to the construction given it by the highest court of a State.' O'Brien v. Skinner, 414 U.S. 524, 94 S.Ct. 740, 38 L.Ed.2d 702 (1974).

V

Although any durational residence requirement impinges to some extent on the right to travel, the Court in Shapiro did not declare such a requirement to be per se unconstitutional. The Court's holding was conditioned, 394 U.S., at 638 n. 21, 89 S.Ct., at 1333, by the caveat that some 'waiting-period or residence requirements . . . may not be penalties upon the exercise of the constitutional right of interstate travel.' The amount of impact required to give rise to the compelling-state-interest test was not made clear.¹⁰ The Court spoke of the requisite impact in two ways. First, we considered whether the waiting period would deter migration:

'An indigent who desires to migrate . . . will doubtless hesitate if he knows that he must risk making the move without the possibility of falling back on state welfare assistance during his first year of residence, when his need may be most acute.' Id., at 629, 89 S.Ct., at 1329.

Second, the Court considered the extent to which the residence requirement...